From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Tonight: More Maher
The new season of Real Time starts tonight, which is a real pain because it means I have to switch the channel from Rachel to HBO at 10, which aggravates my button-pushing finger and takes away from my quiet Lockup time. But it's always worth it. To prime the pump, some of Maher's New Rules for 2012 in The New York Times:
New Rule If you were a Republican in 2011, and you liked Donald Trump, and then you liked Michele Bachmann, and then you liked Rick Perry, and then you liked Herman Cain, and then you liked Newt Gingrich ... you can still hate Mitt Romney, but you can’t say it’s because he’s always changing his mind.
New Rule You can’t be against same-sex marriage and for Newt Gingrich. No man has ever loved another man as much as Newt Gingrich loves Newt Gingrich.
New Rule Let’s stop scheduling the presidential election in the same year as the Summer Olympics. I get so exhausted watching those robotic, emotionally stunted, artificial-looking creatures with no real lives striving to do the one thing they’re trained to do that I barely have energy left to watch the Olympics.
The funniest part of his column may be the Times' correction that appears at the bottom:
Correction: January 8, 2012
Bill Maher’s essay on Jan. 1, on new rules for the new year, was incorrectly labeled. It was an opinion article, not a news analysis.
Phew. Glad they cleared that up.
Your west coast-friendly edition of Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Friday, January 13, 2012
Note: Today is the first of three Friday the 13ths in 2012. The next one, in April, will be "terrifying" and the one after that, in July, will be "cataclysmic" But today's is just "annoying." Probably a rash or one of your gutters will fall off the roof.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til Michelle Obama's 48th birthday: 4
Days `til the 29th annual Lowcountry Oyster Festival in Charleston, South Carolina, starring 80,000 pounds of shucked oysters: 16
Percent of American workers who think rewards are distributed less fairly and more fairly, respectively, vs. 5 years ago: 65%, 3%
(Source: Harris poll via USA Today)
Sales of cholesterol-lowering "statins" in 2010: $19 billion
Increase in statin use between, respectively, 1988-1994 and 2005-2008: 2%, 25%
(Source: National Center for Health Statistics)
Percent of Republicans who say they believe the current economic order "favors a very small portion of the rich": 62%
(Source: Harper's Index)
Percent support for, respectively, Jon Huntsman and Stephen Colbert in the South Carolina primary: 4%, 5%
(Source: PPP poll via MSNBC)
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Think small
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CHEERS and JEERS to dollars and sense. I ain't no economist, so I depend on the headlines to keep me just educated enough to win arguments with my butler. Here's what I learned from the dead-tree press and the interwebs:
> Retailers report record $4.7 trillion in 2011 sales
> Oil drops below $100 a barrel
> Home Depot to hire 70,000 seasonal workers for spring
> Novartis to cut nearly 2,000 U.S. jobs
> More than half of employers say they can't find skilled workers
> Banks' earnings likely to reflect a tough quarter
> JP Morgan profit drops 23%
> R.I.P. Department of Commerce?
> Europe edges closer to a recession
> Mood upbeat on hopes for Eurozone
> S&P to downgrade France, other EU nations
> U.S. government on pace for smaller deficit in 2012
> Foreclosures drop
> Fed Survey: economic conditions improving
And this just in: Your boss may be slowly killing you. My guess: arsenic in the doughnuts.
JEERS to today's boring correction. If this photo actually showed Mitt Romney getting a shoe shine on the tarmac next to his corporate jet, I would've instantly died of Squeeee! So I suppose it's a blessing that, in reality, he was just getting a private wand job. But don’t tell that to Santorum---he might faint dead away.
CHEERS to one of the good guys. On this date 34 years ago, Senator Hubert Humphrey of Minnesota, aka LBJ's vice president, died too young at 66. He was wise:
"Compassion is not weakness, and concern for the unfortunate is not socialism."
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"Behind every successful man is a proud wife and a surprised mother-in-law."
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"Freedom is hammered out on the anvil of discussion, dissent, and debate."
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"The President is the people's lobbyist."
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"Liberalism, above all, means emancipation---emancipation from one's fears, his inadequacies, from prejudice, from discrimination, from poverty."
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"The right to be heard does not automatically include the right to be taken seriously."
Regarding that last one: Stings, don't it, Perry?
CHEERS to new discoveries. A frog discovered in New Guinea that can fit on a dime is now believed to be the smallest animal with a spine. The congressional tea party caucus, however, remains the smallest-minded animals with a spine.
CHEERS to stopping with all the shooting and the banging and the bayoneting and whatnot. 228 years ago tomorrow, on January 14, 1784, Congress ratified the Treaty of Paris, officially ending our War of Independence. It also included earmarks for a pantaloon museum, a giant biodome for the study of butterfly flatulence, and a bridge to nowhere. Say this for Congress---they learned quickly.
CHEERS to doin' it Martian-style. NASA reports that the Mars Science Laboratory---aka that thing up in the sky goin' to Mars---has been firing its thrusters this week. In response, the American Family Association called for an immediate boycott of NASA for such disgusting behavior.
P.S. If that Russian Mars explorer stuffed to the gills with toxic rocket fuel happens to come crashing through your roof this weekend, don’t blame me. I just warned you.
CHEERS to home vegetation. The big TV event this weekend (for me, anyway) is tonight's return of Real Time with Bill Maher, during which he'll trade barbs with Herman Cain, Alexandra Pelosi, David Frum, Rob Reiner and Debbie Wasserman Schultz. The NFL post-season lineup is here. (The Patriots will buck the Broncos Saturday in a game so grotesquely lopsided that officials will stop it during the second quarter out of pity…in my opinion.) Daniel Radcliffe hosts SNL. If you're hankerin' to pop a new DVD in the machine, Harry's got the list at Ain't It Cool News. On 60 Minutes: the CEO of Groupon.
And here's your weekend talking-heads lineup:
Up! With Chris Hayes: Sat. show: Author Michael Mann (The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars); David Roberts of Grist; Alexis Ohanian; a Guantanamo detainee. Sun. show: Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT); Jack Abramoff.
Meet the Press: Newt Gingrich; Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV); Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) and Rep. Tim Scott (R-SC).
This Week: Dunno. Apparently updating their website is something they plan to do next week.
Face the Nation: Newt Gingrich; Rick Santorum; Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC); Jodi Kantor, author of The Obamas (which I've heard is not the hit piece the weekday morning bobbleheads think it is, much to their disappointment).
Washington Week: Beth Reinhard of National Journal and Jeanne Cummings of Bloomberg News on the post-New Hampshire and pre-South Carolina hijinx; Alexis Simendinger of RealClearPolitics.com on why Bill Daley left The Bob Newhart Show The White House.
Fox GOP Talking Points Sunday: It's the full crazy this weekend with Rick Santorum, Chris Chocola of the Club for Growth, and Rick Tyler of Gingrich's SuperPAC Wining the Future; roundtable with Brit Hume, Bill Kristol, Juan Williams and Kirsten Powers.
Happy viewing!
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Five years ago in C&J: January 13, 2007
CHEERS to early retirement. Stick a fork in Mitt Romney. With this pro-gay, pro-choice video evidence...he's done. Meanwhile Mike Huckabee sits back and softly hums Hail to the Chief. [1/13/12 Update: And by "hums Hail to the Chief" I of course meant "ditches politics, gets a gig at Fox, and buys a spiffy mansion." Potato/puhtahto.]
CHEERS to Party Central. Howard Dean makes yet another grand decision, choosing Denver as the site of the next Democratic National Convention. The final hurdle was cleared when the city promised that the snow from '06 would be gone by then.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to the Night Of A Hundred Drunken Celebrities. The Golden Globes---chosen by a handful of eccentric international journalists---will be handed out Sunday. They tend to be a more raucous than the Oscars, in part because they start serving champagne three hours before the show starts (and host Ricky Gervais says he plans to go for broke again---oh, goody). You can peruse the nominations here. As usual, I haven’t seen many of the movies because 1) I'm tired of wasting time on critically-acclaimed flicks that turn out to be crap, and 2) Some of 'em (i.e. The Iron Lady, The Artist) aren’t open here yet. But I'm a sucker for uninformed predictions, so here goes. Keep in mind these are who I think "will" win, not who I think "should" win, which would be, of course, Thor in every single category:
Picture (drama): The Descendants
Picture (musical or comedy): The Artist
Director: Alexander Payne for The Descendants
Actor (drama): George Clooney for The Descendants
Actor (comedy): Jean Dujardin for The Artist
Actress (drama): Meryl Streep for Iron Lady
Actress (comedy): Michelle Williams for My Week with Marilyn
Supporting Actor: Christopher Plummer for The Beginners
Supporting Actress: Berenice Bejo for The Artist
As usual, the most nervous person in the room won’t be a nominee---it'll be the guy in charge of the "bleep" button.
Have a great weekend. Start by checking out the new Romney version of Santorum. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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